It is well known in the prior art to dispense paper tissue, toweling and the like from coreless rolls of such product. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,905,868, issued Mar. 6, 1990, discloses a paper towel dispenser including a housing accommodating a coreless roll and a nozzle of particular construction which defines an outlet through which the toweling is pulled.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,760,970, issued Aug. 2, 1988, also discloses a dispenser for dispensing paper toweling or the like from a roll of such material. The web is pulled from the center of a roll through the bottom of the dispenser. An arrangement is provided to prevent unwanted dispensing of the web under the influence of gravity.
Other dispensers for dispensing from coreless rolls of web material are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,627,216, issued Dec. 14, 1971, U.S. Pat. No. 3,523,653, issued Aug. 11, 1970, and U.S. Pat. No. 2,864,495, issued Dec. 16, 1958.
All of the dispenser mechanisms shown in the above listed patents are for the purpose of accommodating and dispensing from a single coreless roll. Once that roll has been depleted an attendant must refill the dispenser with another roll. This is highly undesirable since a person wishing to use a towel or tissue, whichever the case may be, will find that none is available in the interim between roll depletion and replacement. On the other hand, replacement before depletion results in waste.
While it is known in the prior art to store a plurality of paper toweling or tissue rolls in a cabinet, and in some cases effect automatic transfer therebetween, some of these arrangements do not readily lend themselves to use with coreless rolls, while in other cases such transfer mechanisms are characterized by their relative complexity and high expense. A search of the prior art located the following dispensers for dispensing toilet tissue and the like which accommodate a plurality of such rolls: U.S. Pat. No. 2,991,951, issued Jul. 11, 1961, U.S. Pat. No. 4,177,958, issued Dec. 11, 1979, and U.S. Pat. No. 2,908,451, issued Oct. 13, 1959.
A search directed to the present invention also located the following U.S. Pat. Nos.: 2,302,850, issued Nov. 24, 1942, 4,756,460, issued Jul. 12, 1988, 3,310,167, issued Mar. 21, 1967, and 5,015,089, issued May 14, 1991. These patents do not disclose a dispenser arrangement providing for the serially dispensing of coreless, center-pull rolls of paper toweling, tissue or the like.